I recently guested on a Gerry Anderson podcast called Keep and Destroy, where fans of his shows discuss their favourite episodes and critique (for want of a better word) some of the others.
As today is International Gerry Anderson Day, I thought I would publish some of my notes from the podcast, going into a bit more detail about some of the best episodes.
Narrowing it down to just five was, of course, really difficult, as there are possibly hundreds of entries I could have made. So, if any of your favourites don’t appear, try not to shoot the messenger!
My favourite episodes:
- Dragon’s Domain (Space: 1999)
- Sun Probe (Thunderbirds)
- A Christmas to Remember (Stingray)
- Survival (UFO)
- Avalanche (Captain Scarlet)
Sun Probe
Sun Probe is an episode that typifies the type of story that, in my opinion, is quintessential Thunderbirds: the stakes are high not just for those that need rescuing but for the Tracy family as well.
One minor snag I’ve sometimes found with Thunderbirds is there were a few episodes where we spend a bit too much time meeting standalone characters, allowing us to become invested enough in them to want them to be saved.
As I said, I only see this as a minor pitfall with the show, because they usually executed this well. I simply wish the Tracy family were in slightly more direct danger a little more often, as sinister as that sounds.
Well, it is impossible to have any such complaints about Sun Probe because, in saving the seemingly doomed astronauts destined for a hot date with the sun, the characters we care really about (in this case Scott, Alan and Tin Tin) nearly die in the process. As a result, we enjoy a constant ramp up of tension, as the stakes continue to raise themselves in line with the plot.
Embed from Getty ImagesAnd it also makes the viewer considerably more compelled to be interested in the main cast, especially at this early stage of the show (produced as episode four). The best way to display how heroic the main characters are is to show the cost of their actions and how, in this case, it will never stop them trying to help people.
We get to see some really poignant moments with Jeff in this episode as it dawns on him that the cost of running International Rescue could be losing two of his sons. We also see him conflicted over how much they can ask Tin Tin to risk. He feels very responsible to Kyrano for her, which shows a great side of his character.
And, in turn, we get to see a touching moment between the two men with Kyrano declaring his family’s fierce loyalty to the Tracy’s because they owe him their lives. It’s worth saying I would have loved to see them explore their backstory a lot more on the show but episodes like this do a good job of subtly showing the impact it has on Kyrano and Tin Tin’s relationship with the Tracy family.
This is also the first episode in the series where we get to see the balance between Brains’ brilliance and eccentricities. We even have Alan comment on how disconnected he is in the opening exchanges because he would rather work on Braman than watch the Sun Probe broadcast. Then we see him realise just from television that the Probe’s trajectory is wrong and that the astronauts are in mortal danger.
There’s a lot of my favourite visual memories of Thunderbirds in this episode. The modelling department always did an amazing job with rockets on this show. The metallic structure they go on to use in Terror in New York City for the moving of the Empire State Building, looks really industrial and gritty, as do the fuel tanks and the rest of the launch site.
And this is an episode that typifies one of the things I love most about Anderson productions: the sound effects department. I think what makes these shows so real for a young audience is how massive, heavy and weighty all the ships feel. Compare the Anderson genre (if you can call it that) with classic Doctor Who and even original Star Trek. In Doctor Who, especially, everything feels cheap, not just because it looks cheap but because it sounds it, as much as it pains me to say it as a classic Who fan.
When the TARDIS door opens or a space ship flies by you get a very thin, almost farcical electronic noise. In Anderson shows, a ship taking off, or in this case a rocket, is dubbed over with the most almighty, thunderous noises taken from the real thing.
In this episode, we hear such a cacophony during the rocket launch, we get more almighty roars when the retros fire on Sun Probe and Thunderbird 3, and we get more satisfying rumbles when Thunderbird 2 lands in a howling snow storm. These sorts of things all just stack up to make everything feel really big, important, urgent and in your face.
So, between the cool rocket launch sequence, another memorable Barry Gray score, the first time we go to space in Thunderbirds, and Thunderbird 2 in a Himalayan mountain blizzard, the visual and audible impact of Sun Probe is as successful as the well-executed plot and character development.
